---
title: Terminology in Service Operations Workspace for ITSM
description: Use this reference to understand the key terms and roles in Service Operations Workspace which includes agent types, request, structures and configuration concepts.
locale: en-US
canonical_url: https://www.servicenow.com/docs/r/australia/it-service-management/service-operations-workspace/terminology-used-in-sow-for-itsm.html
release: australia
product: Service Operations Workspace
classification: service-operations-workspace
topic_type: concept
last_updated: "2026-03-12"
reading_time_minutes: 1
breadcrumb: [Service Operations Workspace for ITSM reference, Service Operations Workspace for ITSM, IT Service Management]
---

# Terminology in Service Operations Workspace for ITSM

Use this reference to understand the key terms and roles in Service Operations Workspace which includes agent types, request, structures and configuration concepts.

|SOW terms|Description|
|---------|-----------|
|Agent|A person within your company’s ecosystem \(internal or external\) who can view, work, and respond to your end-user's tickets.|
|Requester|An end-user \(external or internal\) who raises incidents or service requests in the IT Support Portal.|
|Configurable workspace|Workspace built using UI Builder components.|
|Tier 1 agent|An agent who belongs to a service desk group and handles first-level support requests such as incidents and catalog tasks from the Service Operations Workspace landing page.|
|Tier 2 agent|An agent who does not belong to a service desk group and handles complex or escalated work items such as problems, change requests, and incidents.|
|Universal request|A parent record that consolidates related primary tickets such as incidents and service requests — under a single request, giving agents a complete view of an end-user issue.|
|Primary ticket|An individual ticket either an incident or catalog task that is linked to an universal request as a child record.|
|Service desk group|An assignment group designated as a service desk, which determines whether agents in that group are routed to the Tier 1 landing page experience.|
|SOW admin center|A centralized administration interface for configuring Service Operations Workspace settings, migration tools, and workspace components.|

**Parent Topic:**[Service Operations Workspace for ITSM reference](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-operations-workspace/sow-reference.md)

**Related topics**  


[Additional roles for SOW admin]()

[Version compatibility between Service Operations Workspace for ITSM and Service Operations Workspace ITOM]()

[Service Operations Workspace for ITSM data model]()

[Components installed with Service Operations Workspace ITSM Applications]()